Come with us, won’t you, for a look behind the curtain. Here’s an eerily accurate diagram by our UK correspondent Bryony Beynon, showing the inner workings of the MRR headquarters. Speaking as another long-distance shitworker, I can tell you it’s just like being there! I just hope this doesn’t fall into the wring hands…

If you haven’t heard by now, Japan was hit with a devastating Earthquake followed by a giant Tsunami. To all of our friends and those who have family in Japan, all of us here at MRR have you in our thoughts.

Narm Discos sent us this link which may be helpful for anyone searching for loved ones in Japan, and we will pass on any information we receive in assistance to the tremendous relief effort that will be needed.

TOKYO — A ferocious tsunami spawned by one of the largest earthquakes ever recorded slammed Japan’s eastern coast Friday, killing hundreds of people as it swept away boats, cars and homes while widespread fires burned out of control.

Hours later, the tsunami hit Hawaii and warnings blanketed the Pacific, putting areas on alert as far away as South America, Canada, Alaska and the entire U.S. West Coast. In Japan, the area around a nuclear power plant in the northeast was evacuated after the reactor’s cooling system failed.

Police said 200 to 300 bodies were found in the northeastern coastal city of Sendai, the city in Miyagi prefecture (state) closest to the quake’s epicenter. Another 88 were confirmed killed and at least 349 were missing. The death toll was likely to continue climbing given the scale of the disaster.

The magnitude-8.9 offshore quake unleashed a 23-foot (seven-meter) tsunami and was followed by more than 50 aftershocks for hours, many of them of more than magnitude 6.0.

Dozens of cities and villages along a 1,300-mile (2,100-kilometer) stretch of coastline were shaken by violent tremors that reached as far away as Tokyo, hundreds of miles (kilometers) from the epicenter. A large section of Kesennuma, a town of 70,000 people in Miyagi, burned furiously into the night with no apparent hope of the flames being extinguished, public broadcaster NHK said.

“The earthquake has caused major damage in broad areas in northern Japan,” Prime Minister Naoto Kan said at a news conference.

The government ordered thousands of residents near a nuclear power plant in Onahama city to move back at least two miles (three kilometers) from the plant. The reactor was not leaking radiation but its core remained hot even after a shutdown. The plant is 170 miles (270 kilometers) northeast of Tokyo.

How can KURT VILE fans sleep at night knowing that this fucking guy is out there, ruling the universe? Seriously, Timmy Vulgar — punko-futuro from EPILEPTIX, CLONE DEFECTS and HUMAN EYE — makes everyone else look like a fucking joke.

Timmy Vulgar (photo by Doug Coombe)

Bottom line: there are few people in the world making music in the same league as this guy, and Rise of the Green Gorilla, though slightly different from previous efforts, keeps the bar set incredibly high.This is not some artful grouping of bleep-blops unleashed as a vanity project, but a collection of songs that are sometimes harsh, sometimes surprisingly pretty, but always Timmy. There’s a heavier reliance on electronics and synths on this LP than anything else he’s done, yet his particular brand of damage is present throughout.

I like to think this record is just a day-in-the-life type of document, recorded sometime in between eating a small child for breakfast and bedding a starlet from outer space around 3 a.m. This LP contains the lyric, “We survive on marijuana and carrots,” for crissakes. Genius!!!

Grisha from Sevastopol, Ukraine, sent a handful of photos of hardcore bands ASPIRE and STILL who played there back in January. X up and dig in!

Aspire, Sevastopol (photo by Shipa)

Aspire, Sevastopol (photo by Shipa)

Still, Sevastopol (photo by Shipa)

Still, Sevastopol (photo by Shipa)

If you shoot shows and have photos you want to submit for the MRR Blog, send them to: *protected email* Be sure to put “MRR Photo Blog” in the subject. Include your name, the band, where and when it was shot. Just send your best photos – edit tightly. Three to five photos is plenty. We like to exercise a little quality control here…not everything sent in will be posted. Please size your photos so they are 600 pixels (72 dpi) at the longest side.

EARLY WARNING: The Powers That Be at MRR and I have started talking about doing a new photo issue. This one will most likely focus more on people who were shooting in the early days of punk. If you know of any unsung photographers, undiscovered photo collections of punk bands from the late ’70s – early ’80s, or are just interested maybe in interviewing someone, drop us a line!

In this holiest of months in the MRR calendar, we present to you the holiest of issues, the April 2011 Christian punk special! That’s right MRR #335 has arisen! An incisive look at the state of punk through the lens of our Christian brethren. We also managed to squeeze in interviews with New York punk maniax CRAZY SPIRIT, Finnish post-punk anarchos 1981, and creative Detroit music destruction force TIMMY’S ORGANISM. Plus we’ve got North Carolina hardcore courtesy of DEVOUR and SUNSHINE SS, some Gainesville Noize Not Music from MAUSER, and Pittsburgh, PA’s own ICON GALLERY. That is not all! We have a look at Hartford, CT punk house/show space the Whitney House, an interview with Rob from Boston’s legendary SIEGE, an extensive Michigan HC scene report, and an interview with that state’s hardcore basement dwellers ATTENTION SPAN. All of that, plus more reviews and columns than you can shake a Christ on a Crutch at!

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